


i didn't (and don't) want to miss a thing

by AtLoLevad



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M, Family, Fluff, Gen, Some angst, Tony is a good dad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 14:13:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29902293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AtLoLevad/pseuds/AtLoLevad
Summary: Tali's family tree project brings up some hurt feelings
Relationships: Anthony DiNozzo & Talia "Tali" DiNozzo, Ziva David/Anthony DiNozzo
Comments: 6
Kudos: 24





	i didn't (and don't) want to miss a thing

"Abba, I need pictures for my project," Tali leans against Tony's desk, swinging her leg out behind her and peering at her dad.

Tony looks up from his computer and grins. "What kind of pictures, kiddo?"

"Of the family!" Tali sighs heavily - clearly her second-grade homework assignment is exhausting her. "I hafta make a family tree and then write about everyone."

"Oh," Tony replies, mildly concerned. That would be a pretty interesting family tree. A little bare in some places and random off-shoots in others. He scratches lightly at the side of his head. How far back did a second grader have to go with her de facto grandfather's ex-wives?

"Abba?" Tali taps his arm and waves a hand in front of his face. Tony snaps to attention and blinks.

"Sorry, T. We've got a ton of pictures of the family in the photo albums Ima has in the den. Why don't you start there and come find me if you need more help?" he suggests.

"Okay!" Tali agrees easily and skips off to the den, slamming the door to Tony's office shut behind her. Tony winces at the slam, but shakes his head and gets back to work.

* * *

"Hey," Tony rolls over in bed and nudges Ziva's side.

She blinks tiredly and curls closer to him. "No," she murmurs. "Sleep, Tony." Tugging the blankets up to her chin, Ziva presses her face into the pillow and falls back asleep.

Tony frowns and nudges her again. "Ziva, seriously, I need to talk to you."

Ziva grumbles and opens one eye. She glares at him. "Nora will be up very early and I will be the one she calls for. This had better be good, Tony."

"T's been acting weird. I think she's mad at me," he confesses, frowning as he thinks about their oldest daughter's behavior over the past week. He runs a hand through his hair, worrying. Tali's been unusually quiet and moody with him all week. His efforts to hug her were rebuffed and she didn't even want him to continue reading Harry Potter to her at bedtime.

Even his offer to bring her and Victoria to the park after school had been met with a "no thanks, Abba," and a closed bedroom door in his face.

It's hard not to get upset about it. Tony had figured he had at least another 10 years before she hit the moody teenager, I-hate-my-parents phase. The complete 180 from his happy second-grader was jarring to say the least.

Ziva murmurs soothingly, "I am sure it is nothing, Tony. You are being paranoid."

"I don't think so, Z," Tony grumbles. She'd been fine with everyone else in her life - he knew, he'd been watching. It felt distinctly personal, the way she was shutting him out.

"Then talk with her," Ziva suggests tiredly. "She is not a bomb. She will not explode on you."

"That's what you think," Tony mutters. "She's got half of your DNA."

The quiet insult goes unnoticed. Ziva's already fast asleep and snoring. Tony huffs a frustrated breath and rolls over - he probably wouldn't sleep while his mind was spinning, but he figured he'd at least try.

* * *

"Hey, T," Tony leans against the doorframe of Tali's bedroom. "What do you say to some quality time with your old man?"

"Oh," Tali looks up from her book, "no thank you, Abba. I'm going to finish my book."

It's the politest rejection Tony's ever gotten, but it hurts more than anything. He flattens a hand over the side of his thigh and tries again. "How about some help with your family tree project?" He tries to keep his tone light.

"I don't need help," Tali frowns down at the book resting on her lap. "I can do it."

Oh? Is this just an independent streak? Independence he can deal with.

Tony smiles gently. "I know you can, you're probably smarter than I am, but I thought it might be nice to have some help? I can tell you some stories about Pop Pop and Gibbs and the aunts and uncles while we glue pictures."

He's already mentally scrolling through the list of kid-friendly anecdotes, when Tali shaking her head draws his attention. "No, I don't want to hear any stories. You probably don't even know any, really," she mutters the last sentence under her breath, so quiet Tony almost misses it.

Huh?

"T, what's going on?" Tony asks seriously, stepping into the room and kneeling next to Tali's bed. "You've been pretty ..." he pauses and runs through some adjectives in his head, settling on, "short with me lately."

"I'm not short," Tali protests, livening up. "I'm taller than Victoria and the twins!"

Tony allows a small chuckle to escape his lips. "That's not what I meant. I meant that you seem like you're upset with me. Did I do something?"

She shrugs. "I don't know," she mutters, picking at a loose thread on her blanket.

"Hey, you can tell me anything, remember we were partners before Ima came back," Tony says. "T-squared, right?"

"Yeah," Tali gives him a small smile and it feels like progress. So Tony pushes gently.

"So, what's up? If I did something wrong, I want to know so I can apologize. That's how we work, right?"

Tali huffs a sigh and scrambles off her bed, leaving Tony behind as she scampers out of the room, returning a moment later with a big pile of photographs in her hands. The photographs she's supposed to be using for her family tree project.

Tony leans back against the bed, Tali standing in front of him with the pile. She bounces from foot to foot for a moment before shoving the photos into his chest. Tony fumbles for a beat, eventually gathering the photos into a semi-neat pile. He looks down at the top one and is greeted by a photo of himself, Ziva, and Tim - at least 15 years younger and from the look of the background, on an aircraft carrier. A rush of nostalgia hits for the people they were in the past, before life really hit them all.

He looks up at Tali and holds the photo up. "Ima and I used to work with Gibbs and Uncle Tim at NCIS, you remember that, right? We were probably working on a case -" He trails off when he sees Tali's mouth contort into a frown. "You probably don't care about that, though. What's up?"

"There's no pictures of me and you," she says quietly, sadly.

Tony's forehead creases in confusion. He rifles through the pictures quickly and spots at least a handful of shots of the two of them. "T, honey, there's definitely pictures of me and you."

"Not like with Nora! Not when I'm a baby," she pouts, crossing her arms over her chest.

Oh.

 _Oh_.

Tony winces to himself and sets the pile of photos on the floor next to him. "What are you thinking about that, Tali?"

She shrugs, looking small. "I dunno. I guess you like Nora better probably."

Tony's heart sinks to his stomach.

"Oh, no, no way, Tali. That's is so far from true," Tony replies emphatically and opens his arms. After a brief hesitation, Tali climbs onto Tony's lap and buries her face in his chest. Tony tightens his arms around her in a hug and rests his chin on the top of her head.

"How come there's only a few pictures of me as a baby with Ima, but none with you?" Tali sniffles.

There's no chance Tony's going to get into the circumstances surrounding Tali's first two years of life without Ziva in the room to explain as well. Besides, Tali's only eight. She's a smart kid, but there are still things she wouldn't be able to understand.

He sighs. "Well, remember how it was only me and you for a little bit? The years we lived in Paris?"

He feels Tali nod against his chest, so he continues. "You know that Ima was away for a little bit before we could see her. So there's only pictures of me and you from that time, right?"

"Right," Tali says quietly.

"When you were a baby, I had to be away for a little bit, so it was just you and Ima for that time," Tony says gently. "Do you remember it being the two of you?"

Tali shrugs. "I was real little, Abba," she says, matter-of-factly.

"Yeah, you were," Tony laughs softly. "So it's like that, I had to be away for a little, which means there weren't pictures of us. When Nora was born, both Ima and I didn't have to be away any more."

"But why did you have to be away?" Tali grumbles.

"Aw, Tali," Tony sighs, "I didn't want to be away. I didn't want to miss a second with you. And neither did Ima. But sometimes...sometimes grown-ups have to do things that they don't want to do."

Tali's quiet and Tony holds her tighter. "Does that make sense?" he asks.

"I guess," she replies.

"How about we make more of an effort to take more pictures, as many as you want," Tony offers, kissing the crown of her hair.

Tali nods, her cheek still smushed against his chest. "You sure you don't like Nora best because you didn't have to go away?" her voice is small.

Tony pulls back from the hug, crossing his hand over his heart. "Tali, I swear on my James Bond boxset that I love you and Nora exactly the same," he says solemnly. "And if you ever get sad about this again, come talk to me okay? We'll have special Daddy-Tali time, just like we used to."

"Okay," Tali nods and she looks happier than she did before, smiling at Tony. "Hey, Abba, can you help me glue my pictures down? And also how do you spell all of Gibbs's names?"

Tony laughs, hugging Tali close. "You got it, kiddo. Let's go get that family tree finished. I bet we can find a picture of Ima drooling in her sleep too."

* * *

"You two are like peas in a bag again," Ziva says later that night, as she dries the dishes Tony hands her.

The familiar idiom butchering makes Tony grin. He doesn't bother to correct her this time. "Yeah, I was going to tell you later, but we talked it out. T's, uh, well she was feeling bad that there weren't any pictures of me with her as a baby."

"Oh," Ziva's face falls from an easy grin to a concerned frown. She stops drying the plate and just holds it in her hand, bunching up the dish towel in the other. "What did ... what did you say?"

Tony leans one hip against the counter and pull his hands out of the sink, dripping soapy water everywhere. "I didn't tell her anything serious, Ziva. That's a conversation the both of us are going to have to have with her, if she ever really asks, and not when she's only eight."

Ziva hums, a little distractedly. Tony knows she still holds onto so much guilt from the early years, still grapples mentally with her decisions. "I hate that a decision I made has so much of an effect on her," she sighs, setting both the plate and towel on the counter and wrapping her arms around her stomach.

"Hey," Tony says, drawing her attention, "you did what you had to do. Remember what Dr. Rachel said?"

"Mmm, yes, it is not worth dwelling on decisions of the past to the detriment of my present and future," Ziva sighs, repeating something Rachel Cranston has drilled into her head after weeks of therapy sessions. Seeing Kate's sister in a professional capacity had been - interesting - to say the least, but Ziva found that the older woman had helped her immensely.

"Exactly," Tony points one finger at his wife, sending soap suds flying onto her nose. The suds sit there for a moment before dropping to the floor. Both Ziva and Tony look down at the melting bubbles for a beat before laughing. Ziva grins up at Tony, the tension melting from her shoulders. Her pulls her into a hug, getting wet handprints on her shirt sleeves. Tony kisses the top of her head, much like he had done with Tali hours earlier. Ziva relaxes into his embrace.

"You're a good mom and we're all lucky to have you," he mutters against her hair. "Now, let's finish up these dishes so we can go hand with the rugrats."

"That is the best plan you have ever come up with," Ziva laughs into his shirt.

"I dunno," Tony shrugs, offering a cheeky smile. "Marrying you and having kids with you were pretty good too."

**Author's Note:**

> have some fluffy angst lol. i'm pretty sure this vague prompt came from a post coffeedepablo made on tumblr like months ago. which is to say that i've had this like half-written for months and just finally sat down to finish it yesterday lol. let me know what you think!


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